Glow worms at waitomo!

Today we travelled from one coast to te other. So from white sands and crystal clear waters of the east coast the stray bus crossed the country to the more rugged west coast with its black sand and tough surf.

But on the way we stop off at the little village of Waitomo, famous for one thing: its caves! And inside this network of secret caves you can find another hidden treasure. Lots of beautiful, sparkling glow worms!

I chose the more relaxed option out of all todays activity choices and boarded the Spellbound tour. Our fantastic guide, Hop, took is first to a cave on foot and showed us all the different stalagmite and stalactite formations as well as explaining the history of the caves. After a quick biscuit break we head off the highlight of the tour.

All twelve of us don on our fetching hard hats and are lead to a raft. We squeeze on and are asked to turn off all cameras and let out eyes adjust. Then Hop let off a huge blast and boom, thousands of tiny little lights started to appear... And it was truly mesmerising. Like looking up at the stars in some magical land! The raft did a tour of the underground lake and we all just stared up in awe.

Too soon the tour was over and we all climbed back to the surface. Blinking and stumbling our guide has one more surprise. Eels! Huge ones too! Little did I know I would be eating one soon enough...